Heart of Gold
by shootingstarcipher
Summary: After teaming up with Mabel in a bid to win an art competition taking place in Gravity Falls, a childish argument between the two of them results in Dipper entering the competition on his own. One thing he doesn't expect is finding his drawing floating outside the attic window, demanding to be let inside.
1. Call the Doctor

It was all Mabel's idea and by extension, it was all her fault too (though he couldn't avoid taking part of the blame as, after all, it had been _his_ idea to wander further away from the Mystery Shack than they'd meant to). It was Dipper's own mistake - his thirst for mystery and undeniable tunnel vision - that led them to getting lost, but Mabel was the one who was so obstinate that she practically forced her brother to eat berries he knew could have been dangerous. And as it turned out, he'd been right to be suspicious.

It didn't take them too long to find their way back to the Mystery Shack, but by the time they did, Dipper was already beginning to feel ill. Of course, she hadn't eaten any of them herself. He'd convinced her that, if he ate a few of them and managed to go an hour without feeling ill, they were fine and she could eat some. Sometimes he was too selfless for his own good.

Their great uncle Stan didn't even bother to look up when they dragged their feet into the dilapidated building he called his home, though he did grumble something about not working all day under his breath as they trudged past. Dipper went straight to bed, half-heartedly accepting his sister's mumbled apology. He glanced at Wendy, who was lounging at her desk in the gift shop with her eyes only half-open, and rolled his eyes at Soos, who was sitting on the floor beside Grunkle Stan's chair and hanging onto Stan's every word.

He wasn't sure where Mabel went, but in a way, he was glad to be left alone for a while. He slept for hours, completely undisturbed, and woke up in the middle of the night, hungry because he'd missed dinner. Someone could have woken him up, couldn't they? But then he was still feeling sick, so perhaps it was all for the best. Slipping out of bed as quietly as he could so as not to disturb his sister, he tiptoed down to the kitchen to get himself a glass of water. Several of the floorboards - most of them, actually, considering how old and rickety the shack was - creaked when he stepped on them, and he repeatedly checked behind him to make sure he hadn't woken anyone up. The coolness of the kitchen floor spread across his body rapidly and he suddenly regretted not putting on socks.

Mabel was sitting upright in bed when Dipper returned to the attic with the glass of water, and beamed at him when walked in. "Feeling better?" she grinned, but quickly carried on speaking before he'd even had the chance to groan in reply. "I wanted to wake you up earlier to tell you something, but Soos wouldn't let me. He said you needed to rest."

"Soos is right," he grunted wearily as he slid back into bed. In an attempt to convey his need for sleep, he rolled over onto one side, facing the wall and turning his back on his sister. Unfortunately, this simply resulted in her leaping out of her own bed and bounding over to him, desperate for his attention. Shaking him by the shoulder, she grabbed something from under her pillow and thrust it at him, forcing him to pay attention to it. As he discovered upon taking a closer look at it - not that he had a choice in the matter - what Mabel was showing him was a poster she had found whilst roaming the streets of Gravity Falls with her friends earlier that day.

"There's an art competition!" she exclaimed excitedly - with much more energy than anybody should have at 11 o'clock at night, as far as Dipper was concerned - and proceeded to read from the poster (something which her brother was grateful for, seeing as he was far too tired and groggy to read it for himself). "The deadline's in 3 weeks' time. You up for it? You'd better be," she added hastily before Dipper was given the chance to respond. "I was meant to join Candy and Grenda's team but I, being the amazing sister I am, gave that up to team up with you."

He quickly agreed - partly because it really did sound like fun but mainly because he knew she'd leave him alone for a while if he agreed to do it - and managed to fall asleep again in a matter of minutes (once Mabel had gone back to bed herself). That was the last time sleep came easy.

* * *

It had been just short of a month since he, his sister and Soos had had to follow a dream demon into Grunkle Stan's mind and prevent him from telling Gideon, Stan's greatest competitor and Mabel's very own obsessive stalker, the code to the safe that was kept in the back room of the Mystery Shack. Since then, he'd been lucky enough to avoid the demon and as far as he was aware, so had his sister. He should have known it was too good to be true. He should have realised that once Bill Cipher had recognised him as a threat, getting away from him was never going to be that easy. It was clear from the pages in the journal that once Bill decided he wanted something, he'd stop at nothing until he had it. And in Dipper's case, that meant getting rid of him completely, at least rendering him useless when it came to foiling his plans.

"I don't know why you haven't called for a doctor yet," the demon commented, suddenly materialising in front of him. The triangular demon perched on the edge of the bed, the room now flooded with various shades of grey. Mabel was gone from her bed. Dipper didn't know what time it was, or even whether he was awake or not, but one thing he did know was that Bill Cipher appearing in front of him could only mean trouble. "Don't look so depressed, Pine Tree. I'm only looking out for you."

 _Right, of course._ Dipper rolled his eyes. Not only was the nickname annoying already - even though this was the first time he'd heard it in a month - but the idea that he would trust the demon after their last and only other encounter was just absurd. He was well aware that Bill already knew this. As he'd said before, he knew lots of things - even what others were thinking. Sitting up, he pulled the blanket up to his neck, flinching when Bill inched closer to him. He hissed at the demon to stay back - to keep away from him - but he knew before he even opened his mouth that he was simply wasting his breath. Bill didn't care. As long as he got to mess with his mind, he didn't care about anything else.

"Relax, kid. I'm not here to terrorise you," the demon cackled, his large eye gleaming with mischief. As far as the human could tell, he was displaying no malicious intent at the time (still, a momentary lack of hatred did not necessarily indicate a complete change in character). Dipper raised an eyebrow, silently questioning the demon's motives - if he wasn't there to terrorise him, then why _was_ he there? "Oh you know, just checking up on you," Bill replied, despite the human's question remaining unspoken. "You're sick. And people say _I'm_ sick," he giggled manically.

"Yeah, well, they probably mean it in a different way when they're talking about you," Dipper retorted weakly.

"What do you mean _'probably'_?" This time when Bill shuffled closer to him, there was nowhere for Dipper to move to. His legs were already scrunched up beneath him, so the demon ended up sitting in the middle of the bed with his legs crossed, facing towards him. "Look, my point is… you're way too sick to carry on solving mysteries, fighting monsters and what have you." Dipper didn't need to be a mind reader to know where this was going. He narrowed his eyes but kept quiet. "Just give me the journal. I can do it all for you - I'll even tell you about it and help you make amendments to the notes you already have."

He refused to let him go any further. He didn't even wait for the demon to formally offer him a deal and instead denied him access to the journal upfront. He couldn't take the risk. He'd sooner trust Mabel with it, and he was fairly sure she'd manage to lose it within a couple of hours. It was obvious from the sudden burst of scarlet in the demon's eye that Bill wasn't particularly fond of being told no - he absolutely despised it - but rage alone was not enough to convince Dipper to hand over his most prized possession. Recognising his defeat, Bill returned to his own world, disappearing from the bed and allowing colour to swiftly leak back into Dipper's reality.

* * *

Hours later, Dipper was finally starting to feel better. He was still lying in bed and had barely eaten. Mabel hadn't stopped talking about the art competition for over an hour and whilst he found it mildly irritating, he was glad of the company as well as the distraction. If it hadn't been for her, he wouldn't have been able to get Bill out of his head. He repeatedly found himself wondering what the demon's intentions really were. He made a good point about him being ill - maybe he should have seen a doctor - but as he'd found out both from the journal and his previous encounter with the demon, he couldn't be trusted at all.

In spite of the abundance of time they had before the deadline, Mabel was rushing around as if their entry was due the very next day. She had already made a list of things she wanted to use as inspiration (including gnomes, unicorns, and a winged version of Waddles, her pet pig). Dipper had assumed they would simply be drawing the subject of their artwork, but Mabel - as creative and imaginative as ever - had something more inventive in mind. Sculptures, paintings, drawings, abstract pieces of art. A combination of everything artistic. Her suggestions made Dipper reconsider teaming up with her. Surely Candy and Grenda could keep up with her imagination, whereas he'd just hold her back? He pointed this out to her, but she was having none of it.

Scoffing at his lack of confidence, she resumed her sketch of a unicorn which, although she hadn't been working on it for very long, was developing surprising quickly. He wondered how many sketches she was going to do before finally settling on one. She'd already done three that morning (and was in the middle of doing her fourth) and the deadline was weeks away. "Do you think Grunkle Stan has any sparkles?" she asked, pausing. Dipper said that he'd be surprised if he did. Stan definitely didn't seem the type to own any glitter.

Bill had been wrong. Later that day, Dipper was well enough to continue with his adventures again and used the time to help Mabel come up with some more ideas for what the subject of their artwork could be. His sister frequently complained about the large amount of green in the forest, that there wasn't enough colour or even enough variety in the shades of green of the trees. He told her it was because the trees were all the same type, but she didn't seem to care for the reason; she just wanted more variety.

"Not enough pink," she mumbled under her breath, dropping her gaze to the ground and wrinkling her nose at the greyness of the pathway. "You know, it wouldn't be so bad if it was made of cookies - chocolate chip, but rainbow-coloured." She paused for a moment, as if deep in thought, and looked up at the sky. "And the sky could be filled with candyfloss clouds… _And_ it could be raining strawberry milkshake!"

This was why their partnership could never work. Dipper was far too practical. While it was possible to argue that his pragmatism would balance out his sister's ingenuity, he disagreed. He was starting to feel like they were trying to head off in two different directions whilst being tethered together, like instead of complimenting each other's styles, they would just end up cancelling each other out. "Mabel, that's too…" he started, cutting himself off when he saw the saddened look in her eye. And so he kept quiet about his concerns, letting them build up inside his head until they both eventually snapped.

Her lack of concern for feasibility was getting on his nerves so much they broke and his lack of ambition and obsession with realism was far too restricting for her. Breaking up the partnership was a mutual decision. It was better for the both of them. The argument that came with it, however, was something neither of them wanted. And in Dipper's mind, it was all Mabel's fault.

He stayed up late one night - just a few days after the partnership had begun and the same day it had dissolved - to work on his first sketch. His pencil lead kept breaking and he was in desperate need of sleep but he persevered and pushed through the pain barrier in spite of his aching arm. He couldn't go to sleep. Not only did he need to prove Mabel wrong - that he _could_ do it on his own - but he couldn't face going to sleep. Bill Cipher was waiting for him. He could feel it. Every time he'd gone to sleep since the night the demon had appeared in the attic, he'd been unable to shake the feeling that he was being watched, that something would corner him the second his head hit the pillow.

Once he'd finished the basic outline of the sketch he started filling in the details. His figure needed a face, a personality, a history. There had to be a reason for the judges to relate to him. He considered leaving the drawing black and white, but if Mabel had been right about one thing, it was that colour was vital. Artwork that didn't stand out didn't get noticed. The cash prize wasn't what mattered to him; proving to his sister that surrealism wasn't the only valid genre of art was what mattered.

He searched his ridiculously neatly organised pencil case for the coloured pencils he knew he had, only to find that half of them had gone missing and the rest were chewed up at the end. _Mabel._ He gritted his teeth. The only ones that were usable were black, yellow and white. Who ever thought that a white pencil was a necessity? Still, it wasn't the end of the world. He could make it work. Besides, it was only his first sketch.

* * *

Bill Cipher left him alone that night. Another night he could have slept through in peace, but was tormented by the belief that he wasn't safe.

* * *

But Bill didn't leave him alone the next morning.

Mabel must have gotten up already because she wasn't in her bed. A knocking at the triangular window in between their beds woke Dipper up, and he swore he could hear someone shouting "Let me in!" over and over again. Standing up from the bed, he turned to face the window and saw the last thing he was expecting to see. Maybe he did need to see a doctor. Maybe he was still sick. A life-size version of his drawing was staring back at him, floating in the air and rapping his fist against the window.

"Let me in, Pine Tree. I know you can see me!"


	2. Warning

It wasn't unreasonable for Dipper to assume he was dreaming. Bill was just messing with him. Or maybe it wasn't Bill at all; maybe he'd become so paranoid about going to sleep that his mind was starting to play tricks on him (besides, the figure outside the window certainly didn't look like Bill). The being's golden triangular form had been replaced with a human one - the same human Dipper had conjured up on paper just a few hours beforehand. He studied the being carefully, drawing connections between the demon and the character he'd drawn in his mind. There was the top hat, the bowtie, the colours he'd been forced to use on his drawing due to Mabel's lack of consideration for his stationary. Possibly the most prominent similarity between the two was the fact that only one of the being's golden eyes was showing (the other was covered by an eyepatch which was in turn partially hidden behind a mess of golden hair).

By this point Dipper had arrived at the conclusion that in his sleep deprived state, he was being deceived by his own mind and attempted to prove this to himself by checking the sketchbook he'd left on the desk across the room. If the drawing was still there, he decided, then his mind was playing tricks on him. Trouble was, the drawing _wasn't_ there. It had disappeared from the page completely, except the mark his pencil had left in the bottom right-hand corner of the page remained. For a moment, he refused to believe it.

"I'm right here, Pine Tree. All you have to do is let me in." The familiar sound of Bill's voice distracted him from his thoughts and confusion, and his attention immediately gravitated towards the being outside the window. Their eyes met and a shudder ran down his spine. Without a word, he turned away and walked towards the door, heading downstairs. He passed Grunkle Stan on the stairs but was concentrating far too much on the alleged demon floating outside the attic window to notice anything else. By the time he reached the front door and pulled it open, Bill - if it really was him - was already waiting for him outside.

Running his fingers through his hair, the demon stepped inside - pushing the human away in process - and flashed a knowing grin in his direction. "I knew you wouldn't let me down, kid," he beamed, his one visible eye glistening. As he stepped further into the Mystery Shack, the door closed itself behind him - as if by magic. He glanced around the hallway for no more than a moment, and then grabbed Dipper by the wrist and dragged him back up to the attic, knowing no-one else would be there.

Dipper considered the repeated use of that god forsaken nickname - _"Pine Tree"_ \- as confirmation of the being's identity. Before he could ask what he was doing there, Bill interrupted his thoughts yet again with a maniacal chuckle. "You really don't want to believe it's me, do you?" he laughed, a golden cane suddenly materialising in his hand which he then used to push the human back onto his bed. The cane vanished from his hand then, leaving no evidence of its existence behind.

Dipper shook his head and scrambled away from him, backing up against the wall even though the demon hadn't moved an inch. "What are you doing here? And why aren't you in your normal form?!" Bill's visible eye twitched slightly in reply and he put one finger to his lips, silently telling him to keep quiet. The two of them could hear somebody moving about outside the door. Footsteps echoed off the walls in the hallway, louder when they were closer to the door, but faded quickly without disturbing them too much.

"Oh, you know, just fancied a change for once. Good job on this, by the way. It's not bad at all." He kept his voice surprising low, presumably to avoid anyone overhearing him. "I'm not here just to hang out with you, kid. We need each other… besides, I owe you for this." He gestured to himself before returning his gaze to meet with Dipper's and approaching the human ever so slightly, taking one or two steps closer to the bed. Dipper grimaced in response and instead of getting even closer to him, the demon crossed the room to sit in the chair by the desk on which he had found his new body. "We both know you can't win that art competition on your own, Pine Tree. You might like to think that you can and, admittedly you did do a remarkable job on this, but the fact is you need me. Let me be your… inspiration."

"I'm not making any deals with you, Cipher," Dipper growled through gritted teeth. Regardless of the demon's new appearance, he was still Bill Cipher. He was still lethal, still corrupt.

Bill cocked his head onto one side, smirking, but stayed silent. "Alright," he said after a moment of sitting in deep thought. "No deals. But I still owe you for this, so I'm going to help you out anyway." Dipper's mouth fell open in shock but no words could struggle their way out. Based on his previous encounters with Bill, the words _"kind"_ or _"generous"_ were the last ones he'd use to describe the demon and yet, here he was, offering to help him expecting nothing in return. "Don't look so surprised, kid. I'm not all bad." Dipper raised an eyebrow at this statement but soon found himself resigned to the idea of accepting Bill's help - though he remained opposed to officially making a deal with him.

Footsteps interrupted them once again, this time failing to go away quickly. When the door was thrown open and Mabel skipped in, pausing when her eyes landed on a stranger sitting in their desk chair, Dipper suddenly became alarmed and threw himself off the bed whilst the demon remained relaxed and nonchalant. She turned to her brother, who hastily clambered to his feet and stood in between her and Bill and took an almost protective stance. Gesturing to the tall blond stranger in the corner of the room, Mabel asked him (in an annoyingly giggly voice) who it was and - as always - Bill refused to let Dipper speak first.

"The name's Bill. I'm P- er, I'm Dipper's friend." Dipper opened his mouth to protest, but the demon rose from his seat, moving to stand next to him, draped his arm over the human's shoulders and pushed the human's upwards, closing his mouth for him. "Oh, and he's invited me to stay for a while. I hope that's okay with you?"

Completely taken in by the demon's façade, Mabel's face broke into a wide grin and she nodded eagerly, glad that her brother had seemed to find a friend. Up until this point, he'd been spending time with Wendy and Soos but she really thought he needed to find some friends of his own age. The fact that her brother had never mentioned his supposed friend - along with how unlikely it was that Grunkle Stan had given his permission for someone else to stay with them, and the remarkable number of striking similarities between this Bill and the dream demon of the same name - seemed to fly right over her head. Dipper shot her warning look but she failed to notice this as well.

"Well, I'd better be going," she grinned, picking up her backpack from the floor by her bed and turning to face the door. "We're all going to out to find some more inspiration. See you later!" ( _"We"_ in this case probably meant her, Candy and Grenda, seeing as she'd joined their team for the competition following her argument with Dipper.) Slinging the backpack over her shoulder, she bounded out of the room excitedly, leaving her brother frowning after her.

The sudden change in her disposition was unnerving - though Bill had the same unsettling ability. She'd been uncharacteristically cold towards him the night before during their heated argument - a drastic change from her usual cheerful and eccentric temperament - and yet now she seemed to be back to her normal self. As Bill pointed out to him after she left, this was probably just a front. She hadn't forgiven him yet; she was merely pretending she had, possibly to make him feel guilty. According to Bill, this was why he needed him.

He couldn't do it on his own, the demon told him. She'd beat him and make him look like a fool. But if the two of them worked together on it, they could accomplish anything. Maybe he was right.

Pushing any and all thoughts of the journal's warning out of his mind, Dipper closed his eyes and took a deep breath, trying to prepare himself for what he was about to do. "Fine, you can help me. I'm not making any deals with you, but I'll let you help me."

His better judgement was still nagging at him, telling him ignoring the warnings was a bad idea.


End file.
